Speeding up Adiabatic Quantum State Transfer by Using Dressed States

We develop new pulse schemes to significantly speed up adiabatic state transfer protocols. Our general strategy involves adding corrections to an initial control Hamiltonian that harness nonadiabatic transitions. These corrections define a set of dressed states that the system follows exactly during the state transfer. We apply this approach to stimulated Raman adiabatic passage protocols and show that a suitable choice of dressed states allows one to design fast protocols that do not require additional couplings, while simultaneously minimizing the occupancy of the "intermediate" level.